Several years ago, there was a report which said that the 10G/40G/100G optical transceivers would hit 1.44 billion dollars by 2014, driven by 10G SFP+ and tunable XFP modules. It is now 2014, and the forecasts have came true.

Infontetics Research released the report tracking 10-Gigabit (10G), 40-Gigabit (40G), and 100-Gigabit (100G) optical transceivers and transponders sold into the optical transport, carrier routing and switching, and enterprise markets.

In fact, the highlights of optical transceiver market have appeared years ago. Let's make a review.

• 10G, 40G, and 100G transceiver and transponder revenue was forecast by Infonetics Research to grow to 1.44 billion dollars worldwide by 2014, driven by SFP+ and tunable XFP technology, and by spikes in future 40G and 100G adoption.

• Tunable XFPs would be the major 10G growth opportunity for a long time, as they eliminated inventory management issues with fixed-wavelength modules, fulfilled the need for tunability as ROADM-based networking rises in popularity, and replaced the more-costly 300-PIN format.

• Meanwhile, SFP+ would replace XFP in the future, driven by strong growth in 850nm modules for 10-Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) and 8/16G Fibre Channel (FC) applications.

• Shipments of next-generation 40G long-range (LR) and short-range (SR) optical transceivers would begin in 2010, primarily for enterprise and IP router applications.

• Revenue for 40G long-reach interfaces jumped 52 percent in 2009 over 2008, to 114.6 million dollars, while revenue for 40G 300-PIN short- and intermediate-reach interfaces dropped 35 percent, driven by price erosion and demand weakness.

• During the 2011-2012 timeframe, shipments of DQPSK transceivers were expected to outstrip those of DPSK, as the cost differential between the two drops. Worldwide revenue was forecast to grow nearly 10-fold from 2009 to 2014 for the tunable DQPSK 40G fiber transceiver.

Infonetics' report provided in-depth analysis, market size, and forecasts through 2014 frp manufacturer revenue and units shipped for 10G, 40G, and 100G transceivers and transponders. Specifically, the report tracked the following long- and short/intermediate-reach optical transceivers/transponders.

• 10G modules by tunable, WDM (fixed C-band), 1550nm,1310nm, and 850nm wavelengths, split by form-factor such as 300-PIN, SFP+, XFP, X2, XENPAK etc..

• 40G modules by tunable, 1310nm and 850nm wavelengths, split by form-factor such as DPSK, DQPSK, opto duo-binary (ODB) and other, 300-PIN SFI-5, 40GBASE-LR4, and 40GBSE-SR4.

• 100G modules by tunable, 1310nm and 850nm wavelengths, split by form-factor such as 100G DWDM, 100GBASE-LR4 (aka 4*25G non-return-to-zero, or NRZ), and 100GBASE-SR10 (aka 10*10G).

Nowadays, vendors providing products in the optical transceiver market include Cisco, Finisar, Avago, JDSU, and so on. Besides these famous companies, there are also many other manufacturers and suppliers who provide compatible transceivers with much more cheaper prices. For example, the compatible Finisar 10G SFP+ modules in FiberStore are all under 100 dollars!